The dust settles

Chapter 40

I've always considered the people around me smarter than me, not to mention the beautiful Tana.If being smart is the highest affirmation for a person, I can declare her the smartest person in the world without hesitation.But that's not what I'm talking about, it's not about a particularly good sex event as a couple when the clock ticks.Although my nose is full of the sultry smell of a woman's body again, I will say it, although it is difficult for me to start immediately with the thing I want to say.For example, I saw swans take off by the lake. Their purpose is to fly up to the high sky, but they have to drag their cumbersome and worrying bodies on the water, desperately flapping their wings and paddling with their feet. Run on the water, and finally, you can fly into the sky.

I will say that for ten days I began to notice how slowly time was passing in this land.

I am willing to discuss the problems I notice with people, perhaps because I do not easily notice what problems cause this desire.Secretary Gong, Master Huang, and the lame butler are all good opponents for discussing issues.The clerk is even better.That's when time started to speed up.As a result of the discussion, I agree with the clerk.He believes that the speeding up of time does not mean that the sun speeds up its pace in the sky. If the time is measured by sunrise and sunset, it will never change.Measured by things, the speed of time is different.The clerk said that the more things happened, the faster time passed.As time speeds up, it makes people feel dizzy as if they are riding on a fast horse.I have been sensible since the year when Maggie's family planted opium, and I have become accustomed to the continuous occurrence of strange things beyond the routine.In the years after my brother died, apart from collecting taxes on the border and setting up bank accounts, nothing happened on the land of the chieftains.After the opium frenzy and the longest and widest famine in history, the land, after a long strain, relaxed like a postpartum woman into a drowsy sleep.The chieftains are like hibernating bears, hiding in their respective official villages and never coming out to show their faces again.

But on the border, there were so many people coming and going, but no chieftain came to see me.Thinking about it, there are many things worth learning here, but they are afraid, because they suffered a lot from growing opium by learning Maiqi Tusi. After the famine, they hid and refused to meet with us again.

But this is nothing special, and my subordinates pointed out a bright future for me: one day, I will be Maiqi toast and Ronggong toast at the same time.They said that it was I who used my wisdom to marry the only daughter of chieftain Ronggong, and my luck made the killer kill my brother.What pleases me the most is that my uncle often writes to me.And I always sent him one bank note after another through the bank account.

My uncle sent me two photos.

One is with the late Panchen Lama.One was from when I received my first silver bill, and he was with some white Han generals.They were standing on a large flat field with no grass, and something very large was parked behind them.Master Huang told me that it is an airplane, an iron bird, which can shoot at people's heads from the sky.I asked Mr. Huang how many planes he could buy with [-] silver notes.Master Huang said, one wing.I immediately asked him to remit another [-]. I like to have my two iron wings in the sky of China.Uncle said in the letter that the emperor of China was our emperor, and now the Chinese government is also our government.Master Huang said that when this battle is won, the country will become stronger again.

I asked him if there was any way to get my uncle to see me too.

He said, wouldn't it be enough to buy a camera?In the days of waiting for the camera, I feel that time passes more slowly.One day is longer than three.The camera finally came.Master Huang also got a master photographer.As a result, the days passed quickly.We took many photos in various places and at various times.Everyone is crazy about it.The master photographer didn't want to stay here for a long time, so I asked Eryi to learn the craft from him.Among the servants I like, the executioner is the only craftsman. If he doesn't learn to take pictures, who will learn to take pictures?The clerk also made this request to me, but I did not agree.That, too, is history, he said.I disagree.It was just a craft, and he didn't need to lift his pen hand.

Tell me something funny.

One day, Eryi ran out of the photographer's dark room screaming strangely, her face distorted by fear.

Solang Zelang asked if the master wanted his hot ass.The photographer never has a woman's idea, so some people say that he may be a guy who likes men.Eryi doesn't know why, but men who like men always like her.When meeting this kind of person, even a woman will not call out his uncomfortable voice when she meets a man who is unwilling.But today, he did not encounter such a thing.He rushed out of the house and said, "The ghost, the ghost, came out of the paper master soaked in the water."

Master Huang laughed and said, it's not a ghost, it's the person who was photographed on the film developed.Later, I went to see a photographer to develop the photos.When the figure slowly appeared on the paper and under the light of the flashlight, I can only say it was a bit strange, but not how scary it was.But my future executioner got the shit out of me.Some people laughed at him as a coward.But when he executed the execution, he was never ambiguous.Later, Eryi learned the craft, and the master photographer left.When Eryi goes into the darkroom, he also asks someone to go in as a companion.

Since the advent of cameras, our days have been quicker.I sent the first photo to my uncle in Chongqing.

I don't know what year it is, but it's a hotter summer than usual.Uncle wrote me a letter, he asked me to wait until autumn, when the weather is cooler, to go to his place.Master Huang said that the war of resistance is about to be won, and the country will become unified and strong.In the decades without the emperor, we chieftains had nowhere to go, and this situation will soon end.The butler said, your uncle wants you to meet some high officials.It is only after the war that these people come to the place closest to us, and after they are recruited, they have to leave again. At that time, if they want to see these people again, they will have to travel a long way.The clerk said that the combined meaning of these two people was exactly what my uncle meant.In the days of waiting for the arrival of autumn, time passed slowly again.

Tana's enthusiasm for taking pictures has not diminished. Because of taking pictures, she is also enthusiastic about dealing with tailors, and rarely bothers me.

People say it's time to be silly again, master, and they see me staring blankly at the sky, not knowing that I want to be the first to see autumn come, to see the first frost, how to make the trees golden clothes.At that time, I will be on my way.

Chief Mai Qi sent someone to deliver a letter.Since I left Guanzhai, we haven't heard from each other.Toast Maggie's letter was very short. He asked me what I was doing on the border.I replied a letter, and everyone thought it was unnecessary to mention the matter of going to Chongqing to meet my uncle, it was enough to just tell him about taking pictures.His letters were very short, and there was no need for me to reply to him with a longer one.The letter from Mai Qitoast came again soon.The letter said that my mother misses me.The letter also said, there are such fresh things, why didn't the chieftain's son think of asking the chieftain to enjoy it too.Tana said, fuck it.Everyone knows that she is a wayward woman.But I won't be like her.I knew the letter was not finished yet, so I told people to continue reading.The chieftain said a lot of meaningless wordy things in the letter.Finally, he asked if he could come back to Guanzhai and take a picture of his wife, "By the way," the letter wrote: "By the way, we can discuss things about the future, I feel really old."

He had already felt his old age once, and later, he regained his vitality.

So, I decided not to go back, and I only went there with my camera.

Eryi took pictures of them for a few days, and when he left, the chieftain told him that he was old and had no strength or wisdom.Then Eryi said: "Master, the young master asked me to ask, if he dies, will you be young again."

Not long after, Eryi came back with a camera and a shy expression.

He brought a letter full of resentment from the chieftain.The letter said that if I went back this time, he would discuss with me the future of Chief Maiqi, but I didn't go back myself, because I didn't care about the future of the Maiqi family, not him.On this day, I also received another letter, not from my uncle, but from a Han general.

The letter said that my uncle, a great Tibetan patriot, was going somewhere in a boat, but was blown into the river by a Japanese plane and disappeared.

I think the Han people are still very similar to us.For example, if you say something bad directly, it doesn’t sound good and makes people feel uncomfortable, then you can change it to a nice word, a word that doesn’t touch your nerves very much.They didn't say that my uncle was killed in the bombing, that he was dead, and that the body couldn't even be found, but they just used two soft and clever words: missing.

Perhaps it was because of these two words that I didn't feel much pain. I said to the servants: "He buried himself in water."

"My condolences, young master."

"We don't need to go to Chongqing."

"We don't know who Uncle told us to see."

"The general who wrote the letter didn't invite us either."

"I don't want to pay them any more money to buy an airplane."

After a few days, the Japanese surrendered.

I heard that the short Japanese went to a boat to admit his defeat.Later, the red Hans and white Hans fought again.Master Huang's face turned yellower, and he started to cough, and from time to time, he coughed up some blood. He said it was not a disease, but because he loved this country.I don't know if he's telling the truth, but I know the grief of losing my uncle.Sometimes, when I look at his photo, tears flow out of my eyes as soon as they get hot, and I call out: "Uncle!" Even my intestines feel hot.

He didn't say yes to me, just stayed in the photo and smiled at me like someone with a lot of money.He has not had time to go back to India.Originally, he said, when he returned to India, he would amend his will, and let me inherit all the precious stones he had deposited in the British Bank in Calcutta.Once or twice, Tana said she had dreamed about the gems.But not now, the lady of the poor English baron will have them under an unamended will.

Because of this, my wife hated not leaving for Chongqing sooner.

We didn't go to the Han people's place to meet our uncle earlier because we were afraid of the hot weather there.One of the ancestors of Maiqi's family had been to Nanjing, but he died of heat on the way.Therefore, all chieftains who went to Han to meet the emperor set off in autumn and returned in spring to escape the deadly summer in Han.Well, I don't want to talk about these things.Suffice it to say, time sped up again after my uncle died.One thing comes, and another thing follows.Time, things, they go faster and faster and it seems like they will never slow down again.

(End of this chapter)